14 smart company business life ‘The process of refining our ideas will continue for a long time — we’re encouraging everyone who stays at Virgin Hotel to share their views with us. You can never have enough feedback, and you can never stop learning’ Y ou learn so much about a busi- ness in the months before launch, but your education really begins on the day that you open the doors to customers. Since we opened our first Virgin Hotel in downtown Chicago earlier this year, our team has learned a lot more about what our customers want, what works and what doesn’t, and how we can improve. Crucially, we’ve also had an absolute blast developing and running the hotel. Most of the media coverage has focused on how our hotel serves women business travellers. Virgin has launched companies specifically aimed at women in the past, most notably Virgin Brides and Virgin Cosmetics, but they didn’t quite work because the market just wasn’t there to support the products (particularly with Virgin Brides!). Hotels, however, have been run in the same way for the past century, and we see an opportunity to do something not just different, but better. From the beginning, our main goal was to create a better hotel for everyone — it just happened that along the way we started adding elements that women appreciated, from added natural lighting to closets with dedicated spaces for shoes. While we didn’t set out to appeal to women travellers exclusively, we’re more than happy with where we ended up, and we’ll always continue to improve the experience for all our guests. Throughout my career, I have always looked for areas in which customers are getting a raw deal. Female business travellers certainly fit into that category. So many hotels have the same macho, gray, unwelcoming façades that they have had for decades, though it’s widely known that nearly half of business travellers are now women. Men only invite men Many businesswomen I spoke with pointed out that if they aren’t invited on such trips, they miss out on bonding time and the opportunity to get their views across in different settings, which will ultimately hold them back in their careers. But often senior men only invite other men on these excursions. One person said to me that a reluctance to invite women was partly due to worries about awk- By closing existing gender gaps, Virgin Hotel, in Chicago, is hoping to attract and retain women business travellers. FILE I NATION wardness on overnight trips, and even concerns about litigation, particularly in the US. That made our team think hard. As I have pointed out before, sometimes the thing that needs to be changed is so obvious that it’s taken for granted. In this case, we realised that business travellers need different kinds of rooms, now that the market isn’t limited to men. So we threw out the old-school hotel setup. Well-lit hallways We don’t have rooms per se — we ENTREPRENEURSHIP Richard Branson MANAGEMENT » BY DAVID MUTURI How to pick a good fight in your office PEOPLE who stay or work together for extended periods cannot avoid some friction and even levels of fighting from time to time. Yes, there will be times of harmony, peace and coexistence, as is only to be expected. Yet the converse is also inevitable. There will be conflict, disagreement and even negative and sometimes confrontational engagement. Such is the nature of society, throughout history, everywhere. We fight for good reasons and for bad reasons, too. We fight for the greater good of everyone and even for petty and selfish reasons. Whatever the drivers, we all fight at one time or the other. Since you will fight at one time or the other, the big question is, “How do you fight?” I have had more than my fair share of fights with different opponents, in my tour of duty and in life generally. They have taught me many lessons. You could be a fair and sober fighter. You focus on the goal for the fight. You are willing to cede space, time. You make concessions without comprising the greater reason for the fight. Alternatively, you could be an egoistic fighter. You are out to hurt, and humiliate others. You are the kind that must win at all costs, even if the greater cause is lost. You enjoy pyrrhic victories, which is to a victory that inflicts a devastating toll. You therefore win the battle but lose the war. In all this, it to remember fights do not forever. Peopl outlive fights. Some relationships also outlive fights, too. When entering into a figh therefore, kno are getting int should clearly what the ultim is and what good the fight will do everybody. A good fight is fought with a mini- mum of emotional outpouring and low venom. It is common to hear people swearing how they are going to make a fight nasty. This may include bringing in unnecessary issues. We all have testimonies of such incidents. Ego driven When you examine some lost fights that they were began. The — they were ego did not focus on ssues or goals. must fight, do w yourself to be n into it simply cause of your go. If you fight because of your ego, you risk becoming a war- d. This is particu- larly if you occupy a senior position. You even risk fighting for petty causes such as honorifics and precedence. How do people address you? Where do you sit? Who was introduced first? Who shook hands with whom before shaking with the other? Did someone acknowledge what you said or not? You will become a bundle of nerves. If you must fight, remember that you will take some body blows. Indeed, you may not always win. Yet victory is elusive. It sometimes arrives when you least expect it, dressed up in least expected guises. It may take you time to realise that you actually won. This is because you did not clearly define what you were fighting for. You did not, therefore, even realise when the moment to stop fighting came. This is dangerous, for you could end up carrying the fight to the wrong opponents. You must know who the opponent is and why. Don’t go around suspecting everybody to be in the enemy camp and drawing them into your fights with others. Remember, too, that some of the opponents today might be your allies tomorrow. Today’s fight is not, therefore, necessarily the last fight. Go for your opponent with some level of decorum. It does not do you much good to win today’s fight and lose future allies because of the ugly manner in which you fought a previous fight. Audience sympathy Fights are part of the greater game that is our lives. We live in times when even fighting has rules. People are watching you and making judgement on the fairness of your methods. Are you hitting below the belt? Are you abusing your position? Remember audience sympathy is always with the underdog. How will you be judged? Do it with decorum. You never know whom you will need tomorrow. Dr Muturi is the executive director, Kenya Institute of Management. have chambers that are divided by sliding doors. This creates more private space for people. Room service can even be delivered to different chambers directly without disturbing the guests. Outside the chamber, our hallways are well lit, which helps to give women a sense of security. While hotel restaurants usually serve heavy fare, there are numerous healthy options in our commons club for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Of course, focusing on women doesn’t mean our hotels don’t cater to men, Virgin Hotels are all about being inclusive. As is the case for any company, serving all groups is a good path to success. Something that makes our hotel stand out is that we don’t nickel and dime, room service costs street prices, there are no Wi-Fi fees, no cancellation fees when you call before midnight and no early check-in/late check-out fees. These are innovations that will appeal to all travellers. The process of refining our ideas will continue for a long time — we’re encouraging everyone who stays at the hotel to share their views with us. You can never have enough feedback, and you can never stop learn- Tuesday March 10, 2015 DAILY NATION NOVELTY » SOMETIMES, THE THING THAT NEEDS TO BE CHANGED IS SO OBVIOUS THAT IT’S TAKEN FOR GRANTED Disrupting old-school hotel model ing. In January, my wife, Joan, went to stay at the new hotel in Chicago, and I decided to fly there and surprise her (and look around for myself). Like me, Joan is an avid note taker, and when I arrived, I noticed that she already had a fair number of scribbles to share with the staff. Though her comments were overwhelmingly positive, Joan travels a lot, and her feedback will be very useful for improving our services. Shocking statistics On a larger scale, we all need to do more to combat the problem of gender inequality. It is up to everyone, at every business, to ensure that the unique contributions of all individuals are valued. This attitude is certainly reflected in our Virgin Hotels team, and we want to encourage more workplaces to be inclusive. Recently I attended an event where 30 chief executives, including Sheryl Sandberg, the chief operating officer of Facebook, discussed how business leaders could close the gender gap. I took a lot of notes (as I always do) and learned lots about how diversity can be a competitive advantage for any company. Some shocking statistics stood out at me, namely that women represent a tiny fraction of Fortune 500 CEOs (only 5 per cent), and that they hold only 19 per cent of seats on corporate boards and 25 per cent of senior positions at companies. With those sorts of gender gaps, is it any wonder that it has taken so long for hotels to start serving women business travellers? That’s precisely why this market is ready for disruption. This column is part of a weekly series by Richard Branson in which he responds to reader’s questions from around the world. Send questions to RichardBranson@nytimes.